Waking up to pee at night?
This question might be personal, but do you wake up to pee in the middle of the night?
And if you do, are you paying attention to the time when you wake up for a quick bathroom run before falling back asleep?
I would say that 90% of the people I’ve spoken to are in this late-night bathroom boat; waking up to pee usually between 1-3 a.m.
But here’s the thing, waking up to pee in the middle of the night is NOT normal.
Waking up to pee in the wee hours (pun intended! LOL) of the night or morning is actually a huge clue about your health.
It can give you great insight about your blood sugar balance, detoxification organs, and emotional state – all of which ultimately dictate your energy levels and ability to lose weight and feel like your best self.
However, we’ve been conditioned to think that using the bathroom in the middle of the night is common; just a part of getting older and drinking too many fluids before bed.
Personally, I can take down over 8 ounces of water before bed and sleep soundly through the night. And as I’ve aged, I haven’t developed a need to pee in the middle of the night.
I’ve also seen many of my clients turn their late-night potty runs into a thing of the past once they address the underlying issues triggering their body’s need to hit the head.
Aside from waking up to pee providing a clue about your health status, this disruptive habit also interferes with your body’s ability to fully recover at night. This can leave you feeling less rested when you wake up, and more prone to cravings, weight gain, hormone imbalances, and other health issues down the road.
It’s time to re-potty train your body so you can sleep completely through the night, and wake up feeling like your best self.
In this week’s video and blog, I’m going to bust through these late-night bathroom break myths and give you my top tips for solid sleep so you can wake up rested and feel your best!
To start, let’s talk about why waking up to pee in the middle of the night is such a big health deal breaker in the first place.
According to your body’s internal clock, known as your circadian rhythm, the most optimal sleep time frame to feel like your best self is 10 pm to 4 am.
This internal clock is ruled by the sun and the moon cycles.
When the sun rises in the morning, temperature and light increase, letting your body know it’s time to get up and get moving. Morning is when you should have the most energy, and it will slowly taper off throughout the day into the evening in alignment with the sun cycle and your internal clock.
When the sun sets in the evening, temperature and light decrease, signaling your body to prepare for sleep by dropping your energy levels, releasing the sleep hormone known as melatonin, and transitioning into the nervous system’s parasympathetic rest and digest mode.
In parasympathetic mode, your body sends all of its blood flow and resources inwards to organs that support digestion, detoxification, circulation, and restoration.
Based on this internal clock, your body does some massive repair work in the middle of the night while in peak parasympathetic mode from 10 pm to 4 am. If you’re not sleeping, the parasympathetic process is interrupted and this work can’t happen, leaving you feeling tired and unrested the next morning.
This is why if you go to sleep late or wake up in the middle of the night, you still feel tired no matter how much you slept in the next day or how many hours of sleep you got.
So now that you know how important it is to sleep through the night in order to wake up rested and feeling your best, let’s address re-potty training your body so you can get the critical window of sleep you need.
Waking up to pee in the middle of the night is strongly correlated with 3 different scenarios…
Scenario #1 – Your Blood Sugar Drops
This is the most common one I see. When your blood sugar drops too low, your body releases the hormone cortisol to bring it back into balance.
You might know of cortisol as your stress hormone, which it is, among other things. Cortisol is also what spikes in the morning time when the sun rises as part of your circadian rhythm to give you energy to get up and get going.
When your blood sugar drops in the middle of the night, cortisol is released giving you this same boost of energy. It’s like getting a shot of adrenaline, and what does everyone do instinctually when they wake up?…go to the bathroom!
So balancing your blood sugar is the first thing you can do to promote sleeping through the night.
Eating the right ratios of proteins, carbs, and fat at each meal will help you to balance your blood sugar and get better sleep.
When you’re eating the right ratio of protein, carbs, and fats per meal you will:
- Be able to go 3-5 hours or more without feeling hungry or needing to snack
- Have energy for hours and feel recharged
- Think clearly, feel uplifted, and be more positive
Figuring out your food ratios is actually pretty simple. All you need to do is:
- Tune into your body 30 minutes to 2 hours after eating
- Notice how it’s responding to what you ate
- Adjust your food ratios until you get the perfect response!
To help you figure out what ratios are right for your body to get a good night’s sleep, click here to get my Food & Body Language Log.
Scenario #2 – Look at Your Liver
Balancing blood sugar usually resolves about 90% of the peeing at night problems I see, but when it doesn’t completely resolve the issue it’s time to look at your liver.
Based on your internal clock, your liver and other detoxification organs do their deepest detox work from about 1 to 3 am.
If you find yourself waking up during this time, it could indicate a toxic build-up or detox traffic jam. Your liver and detox organs could be burdened by too many toxins or the struggle to eliminate them.
In this scenario, beefing up your intake of detoxifying foods such as beets, grapefruit, lemon, and dandelion can give your liver the boost it needs to do its job.
A daily natural liver support supplement containing ingredients such as milk thistle, dandelion, artichoke leaf, and burdock root can be extremely beneficial given the number of toxins our body is bombarded with on a daily basis.
Pairing this with balancing your blood sugar should do the trick and give you the best night’s sleep ever!
Scenario #3 – Emotional Influences
When you’ve tried loving your liver and balancing your blood sugar but still wake up in the middle of the night, it’s time to address emotional influences.
According to Chinese Medicine, each organ of the body is associated with a certain emotion, and as we just discussed in scenario #2, organs do deep work during a certain time of the night based on your internal clock.
We can put these two clues together to uncover emotional influences waking you up at night.
For example, if you’re waking up in the window of 1 to 3 a.m. associated with the detox organs (i.e. liver and gallbladder), the emotions connected to these can be grief, anger, fear, and depression.
Doing some journaling, meditation, or seeking counseling around these emotions can quickly put your sleep issues to rest. Sometimes we don’t suspect we’re dealing with these emotions, but we are. Grief, for example, isn’t always related to the loss of a loved one. It could be related to a recent job change, as we grieve leaving behind the old ways even with excitement for what is to come.
Bottom line, waking up to pee in the middle of the night is NOT normal and it disrupts your ability to wake up rested and feeling like your best self.
I’ve yet to see a client who can’t sleep through the night when we address these three scenarios, and as I said, most of the time we knock it out with just one.
I’d love to know what you found most helpful about the information I’ve shared.
Comment below with your biggest aha, insight, or takeaway!
